McHenry County Blog

As predicted by anyone with even a rudimentary knowledge of the law, the Illinois Supreme Court has rejected McHenry County Sheriff Keith Nygren’s appeal of the Appellate Court’s unanimous affirmation of Associate Judge Thomas Meyer’s affirmation of an arbitrator’s decision concerning the re-hiring of former Deputy Zane Seipler.

Nygren refused to follow the finding of the arbitrator selected pursuant to the labor contract he signed.

He filed for what is called administrative review, which requires a judge to see if the arbitrator’s decision was reasonable.

McHenry County Sheriff Keith Nygren next refused to follow the administrative review court decision by McHenry County Associate Judge Thomas Meyer.

Nygren appealed it to the Second Appellate Court in Elgin.

When that court panel ruled unanimously in Seipler’s favor, Nygren wasn’t done stalling.

In October, he instructed his attorney to appeal to the Illinois Supreme Court.

Now the State Supreme Court has refused to hear the case and remanded it back to the Appellate Court.

Today that Springfield panel ruled in Seipler’s favor, as you can see below:

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What next, the United States Supreme Court?

Two local officials have taken different paths when it comes to whether or not to appeal an Appellate Court decision that they don’t like to the Illinois Supreme Court.

Grafton Township Supervisor Linda Moore lost in the Appellate Court on whether she can appoint a township attorney without the approval of the Town Board, on which she has one out of five votes.

Her choice, John Nelson, the man who won virtually all the rest of Moore’s disputes with the Township Trustees, was approved by Circuit Judge Michael Caldwell, but his decision was overruled in the Elgin-based higher court.

It was not worth the money to find out whether her attorney’s arguments, rejected in Elgin, would resonate in Springfield at the Illinois Supreme Court.

In sharp contrast, Sheriff Keith Nygren is off to the Illinois Supreme Court in his continuing effort to keep former Deputy Sheriff Zane Seipler from going back to work.

Nygren didn’t just lose in Appellate Court (3-0), he lost in Circuit Court before Judge Thomas Meyer and before an arbitrator, who determined the facts in the case. Judge Meyer was acting on a administrative review brought by Nygren and the Judge ruled that the arbitrator’s decision was reasonable.

So, let’s compare and contrast.

Both Moore and Nygren are elected officials.

Moore won in Circuit Court and lost in the Appellate Court.

Nygren lost his case before

• an arbitrator
• a Circuit Court Judge and
• an Appellate Court panel of Justices.

Moore decided not to waste taxpayers’ money by appealing to the Illinois Supreme Court.

Nygren didn’t.

A decision by the Illinois Supreme Court striping Urbana’s Provena Covenant Medical Centerl’s not-for-profit real estate tax exemption will reverberate across the state. Thanks to Capital Fax Blog for alerting me to the case.

Folks in Cook County have already been eying taxing hospitals. The Legal Assistance Foundation of Metropolitan Chicago filed a brief in support of ending the exemption.

This case may mean that any Board of Review can impose taxes on a hospital by removing its charitable exemption, if the Illinois Department of Revenue agrees.

Elgin’s Provena St. Joseph Hospital is part of the four-facility Catholic Church ownership group.

2nd Appellate Supreme Court Justice Robert Thomas concurred with the opinion.

The property tax bill in question amounted to $1.1 million.

Below is the reaction of the hospital to the decision:

Provena Covenant Officials Comment on High Court Ruling
03/18/2010Officials at Urbana-based Provena Covenant today released the following statement regarding an Illinois Supreme Court ruling that denied the Catholic hospital ministry exemption from paying property taxes:

“We are deeply disappointed that the Illinois Supreme Court has denied the property tax exemption of Provena Covenant Medical Center,” said Jon “Cody” Sokolski, Chair of the Board of Provena Covenant Medical Center.

“Provena Covenant Medical Center cares for all in our community who need our health services regardless of their ability to pay. Throughout this controversy, we continued to demonstrate that enduring commitment to Urbana-Champaign. In 2008, we provided more than $38 million in free care and other community benefits. Our goal is to carry on in our charitable works, despite the fact that this ruling restricts our ability to do so.”

David Bertauski, President and CEO of Provena Covenant, added,

“We are deeply grateful to those who support us, especially our dedicated employees who selflessly bring compassionate, faith-based care to our patients each and every day.

“We can only hope this troubling ruling prompts a dialogue among hospitals and elected officials to dialogue about not only how we define charity care but also how we better ensure that the people who need financial assistance get it. We will work to lead the way.”

In reading the decision, one deciding factor seems to be

“its funds are not derived mainly from private and public charity and held in trust for the purposes expressed in the charter. They are generated, overwhelmingly, by providing medical services for a fee.”

Another deciding factor was Provena

“likewise failed to show by clear and convincing evidence that it satisfied factors three or five, namely, that it dispensed charity to all who needed it and applied for it and did not appear to place any obstacles in the way of those who needed and would have availed themselves of the charitable benefits it dispenses.”

This part of the decision seems important:

“While Illinois law has never required that there be a direct, dollar-for-dollar correlation between the value of the tax exemption and the value of the goods or services provided by the charity, it is a sine qua non of charitable status that those seeking a charitable exemption be able to demonstrate that their activities will help alleviate some financial burden incurred by the affected taxing bodies in performing their governmental functions.”

In a dissent by Justice Ann Burke, she wrote,

“By imposing a quantum of care requirement and monetary threshold, the plurality is injecting itself into matters best left to the legislature.

“The legislature did not set forth a monetary threshold for evaluating charitable use. We may not annex new provisions or add conditions to the language of a statute.”

The wife of Chicago Alderman Ed Burke is, of course, a Democrat.

She “also disagree(d) with the plurality’s conclusion that Provena Hospitals was ‘required to demonstrate that its use of the property helped alleviate the financial burdens faced by the county or at least one of the other entities supported by the county’s taxpayers.’”

The only candidates that I have seen campaigning for the 2nd Appellate Court were endorsed today by the Chicago Tribune.

Mary Schostok, who held a fund raiser in Crystal Lake Thursday night, and Ann Jorgensen, who was Schostok’s “special guest” at the event, were given the nod by the leading paper in Illinois.

Jorgensen was even mentioned as a possibility to succeed Bob Thomas on the Illinois Supreme Court.

And, the endorsement came complete with color photographs. That doesn’t happen that often.

Meanwhile, Jorgensen opponent Kenneth Moy mailed out an 8½ by 11 inch post card this past week, which you see below. Click to enlarge any image.

Running a very low key campaign against Schostok is McHenry attorney Donna Kelly. I am told she is a very talented lawyer with a resume that portends future judicial campaigns likely to have more success than this one.

Billing himself as the only non-millionaire in the race for the Republican nomination for governor, State Senator Kirk Dillard spoke to mainly women at Crystal Lake’s 1776 restaurant Tuesday morning.

He related having received this advice from his former boss, former Governor Jim Edgar:

“You must find a way to attract women and Latinos.”

Jobs, education and safety are the approaches Dillard said he was taking for both demographics.

My friend Pete Castillo and I arrived during the question and answer session for the 45 or so McHenry Countians in attendance.

Dillard reflected on his ability to work with newly-elected Senate President John Cullerton:

“We work on things we can get along on.”

In answer to a question about the pension debt hanging over Illinois, Dillard came out in favor of a two-tiered pension system with new employees not being guaranteed a certain amount each month.

(Government pensions are typically called “defined benefits.” They guarantee a certain amount each month and, in the case of Illinois, a 3% increase each year whether inflation is lower or higher. Private enterprise has moved from the defined benefit approach to a “defined contribution” approach in which the employer agrees to put so much a pay period into a pension pot. The amount available for retirement depends on how the money is invested and whether and how much the employee sets aside his or her own money for retirement.)

Dillard said he thought he was the only one who could pull that off (not his words). In a telephone town meeting with Andy McKenna, I heard his rival take something of a similar approach to reforming future pensions.

Dillard pointed out that the pension problem is not just one for state taxpayers. Local governments’ police and fire protection personnel have similar problems of under funding.

“We can’t sustain” the state pension situation, Dillard said. If something is not done about the pension system, “we will have no money for education, (hospitals and other functions financed by state government).”

Why does Dillard say that?

Because the Illinois state constitution pretty much says that pensions get paid first. At least as long as members of the Illinois Supreme Court get pensions like other state employees.

“I’m the person who has the political courage to get it done),” the state senator said, indicating he would tell state employee union leaders,

“If we don’t make these changes, we’ll go insolvent and a Federal bankruptcy judge will (impose) them.”

A question was asked about providing “tax credits up to a certain level” for contributions to not-for-profit organizations. Credits are subtractions from what one owes in state or federal income taxes.

Dillard indicated his support for such a change in the income tax law because not-for-profit groups provide better services cheaper than state government.

Touching on the precarious nature of state finances, Edgar’s former chief of staff pointed out that bills were paid in 17 days when the former governor was in office, but now a nursing home in his district hasn’t been paid “in more than five months.”

More tomorrow.

The Chicago Sun-Times ran write-up of Chicago’s Inspector General David Hoffman’s candidacy for the Democratic Party’s nomination for the U.S. Senate to replace Roland Burris.

At the bottom, was another article, next to which was a list of “THE FIELD.”

Take a look.

At the bottom are the Republicans.

At the bottom is the name of “blogger Andy Martin.”

Above his name were

• U.S. Rep. Mark Kirk
• Retired Judge Don Lowery
• Matteson resident Eric Wallace
• Hinsdale businessman Pat Hughes

Martin, who used to be known as Anthony Robert Martin-Trigona, ran in the GOP primary for governor in 2006 using the simpler version of his name. He got 6,095 votes.

When he ran for the Republican nomination for U.S. Senate in 2008, however, he received 240,548 votes. Steve Sauerberg won the race. Sauerberg didn’t spend a lot of money, so I figure Martin has a pretty good ballot name.

The Chicago Tribune trashed Martin on its front page. It wasn’t a real professional article. In any event, the article and lack of respect from and coverage by mainstream media show in the disdain that they have for his running for public office.

My guess is that Martin could afford to spend some money on a campaign, but evidence of his spending much has not been seen.

He is quite good at doing things Pat Quinn got lots of publicity for when he was seeking office.

For example, last week when the Illinois State Republican Central Committee refused to allow him to campaign in the Ag Director’s lawn, where the big doings were at the State Fair’s Republican Day, he went to Sangamon Court and forced his way in.

Martin has a law degree from the University of Illinois, but was denied a license to practice by the Illinois Supreme Court shorting after the Roy Sophisberg-Ray Klingbeil Civic Center Bank scandal. He has said he worked with Chicago Daily News reporter Charles Nicodemus on the story and not being granted a law license was pay back.

But Andy Martin is the name that you will see rarely mentioned in coverage of the U.S. Senate.

He has run for office many times in Illinois, Connecticut, Florida.

Year after year, when the choice came down to pump more money into State Aid to Education or pay pay the state’s share of pension payments, teacher unions took the money and ran.

As far back as the 1970′s, current teacher raises trumped paying for future pensions time and time again.

That’s what hit me while I was reading today’s Chicago Sun-Times editorial entitled,

Teacher union leaders knew that as long as the Illinois Constitution is interpreted by the Illinois Supreme Court–who are in a public pension system just like they and I are–pensions promised would be pensions paid, even before future State Aid to Education.

How disingenuous it is for those in the know (and I’m not counting the Sun-Times editorial writers as necessarily being among such folks) to argue

“That liability, it’s important to note, cannot be blamed on excessively generous pension benefits.

“Instead, it is largely reflects failures year after year by the sate to pay its fair share.”

If you are or were a legislator beholding to the Illinois Education Association or the Illinois Federation of Teachers (and way too many Republicans recruited by Lee Daniels were and are) would you chose to come down on the side of

• the teachers lobbying you and living in your district for higher wages or
• retired teachers who may or may not live in your district, when you know future legislators will have to come up with the pension money, not you?

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These striking teachers are from Huntley School District 158. Last year they “settled” for 5.25%, with less in salary in future years, but the difference going to lessen their share of the current teacher pension burden.

Yesterday, McHenry County Blog suggested Governor Pat Quinn was attempting to recreate the hated personal property tax, which died an electoral death in November, 1970.

I explained how county treasurers throughout Illinois tried to put heat on legislators by enforcing this quite unfair tax.

One spring, we noticed that a state representative, George Burditt, had introduced a bill to require payment of personal property taxes before the Secretary of State would issue a car’s license plate.

En mass, a group of county treasurers arrived unannounced at the little hearing room on an upper floor behind the House chambers.

I remember sitting there while Antioch’s Bingo Bill Murphy argued against imposing (or, maybe, it was lowing) the blood alcohol limit. He said he drank more than that and he could drive just fine or something like that.

When it came to our bill, the Motor Vehicle Committee members were surprised that good government representative Burditt’s bill had so many supporters…and elected officials at that.

It passed out of committee and even passed the House before it died in the State Senate.

My state senator, Bob Coulson of Waukegan, took notice.

He introduced a constitutional amendment to exempt individuals from the personal property tax. That got the heat off the legislators and put it on the electorate.

The county treasurers were fine with that.

It passed the general election of my fourth year in office. The year was 1970.

I remember the Crystal Lake Jaycees took “Give Dirty Water the Works” campaign brochures and printing a pitch about abolishing the personal property tax on the back.

I was GOP precinct committeeman in Algonquin Township Precinct 7 at the time. Only one or two people voted against the amendment.

Naturally, it passed statewide.

When a case challenging the constitutionality of that amendment went to the Illinois Supreme Court, it was ruled unconstitutional with only one dissenting vote.

That was our Justice Charles H. Davis, the Rockford man who courted McHenry County Courthouse officials in his campaign to get the nomination. (I remember talking with him in the closest thing I had to a private office. It was a cubical we had built in the middle of the old courthouse hall. To say we were short for space was a huge understatement.

The case went to the United States Supreme Court, where it was ruled constitutional without a dissenting vote.

And, after all that work to get rid of the personal property tax, Governor Quinn is upping the ante for driving a car.

It looks a lot like a personal property tax to me…especially, as we county treasurers of the late 1960′s envisioned it under Burditt’s bill.

Don’t pay your tax and you can’t drive your car.

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George Burditt ran for the U.S. Senate in 1974. The car top is from that campaign, which he lost to Adlai Stevenson III by 726,612. (I lost to Roland Burris for State Comptroller in 1982 by more.)

The building is the Illinois Supreme Court Building in Springfield.

The subject, of course, was impeachment.

Here’s the part of the article about State Rep. Jack Franks (D-Marengo):

“State Representative Jack D. Franks, a Democrat of McHenry County who is chairman of the House State Government Administration Committee, said in an interview on Friday:

‘I don’t think the judiciary should be telling the executive branch what to do. We’ve got to make sure we do it right. And no matter how loathsome this governor is, we cannot trample on our constitution.’”

Franks is making the argument I would make.

Supreme Court, butt out.

The mention is contained in an article about Attorney General Lisa Madigan’s petitioning the Illinois Supreme Court to relieve Governor Rod Blagojevich of duties mentioned in the criminal complaint that led to his early Tuesday morning arrest.

The article also mentions Franks bill to prohibit a governor from appointing a United States Senator, “if the governor has been arrested, charged, or indicted for a felony offense” and the case isn’t settled.

There is no mention in the article of Tom Cross’ House Republicans’ filing of a resolution calling for the establishment of an impeachment investigation committee.

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State Rep. Jack Franks can be seen on top and State Rep. Tom Cross on the bottom.

The subject, of course, was impeachment.

Here’s the part of the article about State Rep. Jack Franks (D-Marengo):

“State Representative Jack D. Franks, a Democrat of McHenry County who is chairman of the House State Government Administration Committee, said in an interview on Friday:

‘I don’t think the judiciary should be telling the executive branch what to do. We’ve got to make sure we do it right. And no matter how loathsome this governor is, we cannot trample on our constitution.’”

Franks is making the argument I would make.

Supreme Court, butt out.

The mention is contained in an article about Attorney General Lisa Madigan’s petitioning the Illinois Supreme Court to relieve Governor Rod Blagojevich of duties mentioned in the criminal complaint that led to his early Tuesday morning arrest.

The article also mentions Franks bill to prohibit a governor from appointing a United States Senator, “if the governor has been arrested, charged, or indicted for a felony offense” and the case isn’t settled.

There is no mention in the article of Tom Cross’ House Republicans’ filing of a resolution calling for the establishment of an impeachment investigation committee.

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State Rep. Jack Franks can be seen on top and State Rep. Tom Cross on the bottom.